Saturday 24th Jan

Wow, another sunny Saturday and the third soaring weekend in a row at Shenington in January. Is this a record??

Saturday dawned very cold. Didn't appear very windy but when we arrived at the club there was a decent northwesterly at height and a K13 half way down the ridge - Paul F taking a visitor Jonny for a trip! JYR had already gone soaring with Phil A & George heading off to the West to find some weak wave. Closer to home Alistair F was on the ridge with HJD, Trish was preparing to launch HMB, and the club kit was launching from the clubhouse. Bruno & Paul F were in charge, with Dave G as tuggie, and lots of willing helpers.

It's very convenient flying from the clubhouse field (apart from the issue of where to park the cars!) so people popped indoors to eat Mary's soup or warm up, Derrick organised a mass move of the pool table from one building to another, and the Shenington Comps Committee had another meeting in preparation for June's (over-subscribed) competition. There was lots happening wherever you looked, and plenty of flying. The K8 was kept busy with a succession of pilots including Lech, Roger, Tess, Max and Derrick. Tim & Andy, Gary, Terry, Paul and others flew the two seaters. I'm sure it was trying to be thermic but for most of us it was a tussle with the ridge, some with more success than others!

Here's hoping that the good run of weekends continues.

Weekend 17-18th Jan 2015

Happy New Year All!!

We've had a good start to the year with the first soaring of 2015 on the ridge last weekend. This weekend it was the turn of some weak wave...photos courtesy of Rowan.

Saturday dawned sunny but very cold, with wisps of low cloud and misted canopies. We had a late start because of this, but got flying around lunchtime with triple Charlie and the tug at the north end of the field. John W was on duty, and flew with two visitors, plus Keith from Bidford. Rowan was tuggie and took this shot of the empty launch point as he taxied back into position to wait for a K13.

 

Martin Wells turned up and blew the cobwebs off his lovely LS8 321. Martyn got the longest flight off the day - 1 hr 20 off a 3000' aerotow, contacting some weak wave and gaining some height back from that - and came back thoroughly frozen! He treated us to the standard LS8 flypast....hopefully you can see it on this photo if you look over the K8:

Later we got the K8 out and Paul Barnes, Lucy & I had a flight each on the winch. Rob Batty flew his first aerotow session as P2 and did an excellent job, plus had some training on the winch too!  Eric was a star and drove the winch all day, while Kev worked hard on trying to fix the tractor - thanks very much to both of them for all of their efforts.

We flew till dusk and managed to get everyone in the air that wanted to fly, so not bad for a January day. Then back to the clubhouse for tea and beer.....

On Sunday the day started foggy, then cleared with a light northerly (and chilly!) wind. The conflict between the active kart track and the wind direction meant that the only flights were aerotows, so out came our trusty Chippie again (now back in the main hangar). 

George D was DI and took first Liz then Mary for a flight in triple Charlie. Lech flew CCC solo then Eric & Alistair went for a flight, followed by George and Shaun.

Rowan spotted this interesting new landmark (see above) to the South of the field - looks like a new solar 'farm' in a field to the south which might provide a useful pointer to the airfield in summer.....providing we have some sun that is!

Another good day. Thanks to all who helped out at the weekend. See you all next week!